baby activities

I took inspiration from Sewing School’s blog and decide it would be fun and a challenge to bring tapestry to toddlers! I saw this lovely tapestry table Sewing School had created.

I loved it. But how to get toddlers sewing? I repurposed a large empty picture frame and chose some netting I’d picked up from Gloucester Scrap Store. This left the problem of needles! With no budget for this I found a perfect solution knocking about in the garage. Plastic plant seed labels!

These have pointed ends but aren’t sharp and they have a ready made hole that wool can be threaded through. I sewed the netting to the frame with wool and attached needles with various threads including ribbon, wool, curling ribbon, and string. We clamped the frame between two chairs to stand it up and…

It’s good team work, passing the needle through to each other!
We quickly got the hang of it and over a couple weeks lots of Tiny Adventurers added to it!

.

I added buttons to the netting and shapes that could be buttoned on or sewn on and after a while its started to look really lovely!

This is a great collaborative project that can be added to over long periods!

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.

Early Years STEM Activity:
Inspired by Squishy Circuits website we decided to play around with dough and the simplest equipment: Dough (shop bought play-doh or homemade salt dough), LEDs (from your local electronics shop or some old Christmas tree lights) and 9V batteries. If you have some crocodile clips it helps but it’s not essential!

Here is a circuit with out crocodile clips! To get your LEDs to light you need two separate pieces of dough connected to the two terminals on the battery and the LEDs have to connect the two pieces of dough to complete the circuit. LEDs only allow current to flow in one direction, so if they don’t light turn them around!

Avoiding problems:
Don’t test the LEDs by touching them on the batteries directly as this will damage them! We tried AA batteries but the current was too small. We also tried Christmas tree bulbs, but the current was too small to light them (LEDs need much less current).
Now add curious toddlers and parents!

Dough play with a new twist! Could this be used to get daddies involved in dough play?

There is plenty to enjoy in this activity box. We coloured the rice using food colouring and added lots so seasonal treasures we’ve found on our walks, such as acorns, conkers, pine cones, and sticks. Next I raided the kitchen cupboards for some walnuts, cloves, star anise and cinnamon sticks. We added some cloves to a couple of oranges (great fine motor skills activity) in a christingle style.

The result is a superb smelling, heuristic, sensory box to stimulate the senses
. With the addition of tweezers and scoops it is great for fine motor skills! Super for engaging curious little minds.

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.

I was inspired by Triple T Mom to whip up some Coconut Cloud Dough for one of our Tiny Adventure Workshop activities last week! It’s so simple and needs only two ingredients- flour and coconut oil! Actually coconut oil is a bit pricey, so I used veg oil and a bit of coconut body balm I had sat around on a shelf. The result was a beautiful smelling, moldable sand. We chucked in a coconut as a prop.

It was a lovely sensory activity. We had great fun shaking the coconut to hear the liquid inside!

We moved magnetic items around our mirror board using magnets underneath. If your fridge magnets are a bit small put them in a child’s sock and knot the end. It’s lots of fun. Theirs also lots of fun to be had picking up the magnetic items and pushing the magnets together to feel them attract and repel.
Next we suspended paper clips in mid-air using magnetic attraction. The paper clips were tethered to a crate with cotton. This is super for practicing gross motor skills. The paper clips follow the magnet as it is moved and drop down when the distance between them and the magnet is increased. It took my three year old a few goes before he could hold the magnet steady, suspending the paper clip. My Two year old got lots of joy out of just picking up the paper clips!

His efforts payed off! “Look mummy, it’s not touching!”

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.

This week we adapted our sticky wall activity slightly to enable us to make a fabric collage. We used sticky back plastic (the kind you use to cover books) and a bit of masking tape to produce a sticky table. I’ve been collecting scraps of material for ages without much idea of what to do with them. Turns out they are perfect for this. It’s great because we can keep moving the fabric around and peal them off when we are done.

If the plastic hasn’t lost too much sticky you put the wax paper backing back on and save it for another day. We saved ours and put it up o the window the next day to carry the activity on.

Happy sticking!

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.

Before you use your birdseed to make winter bird feeders with your toddlers, why not use it as a base for an Autumn sensory box? We added lots natural materials for the little ones to examine and some toy bugs. The different seed sizes are great for improving fine motor skills with tweezers and tongs.

We selected some treasures from the box to use for dough play!

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.

We are bonkers for conkers! They are a super, free and plentiful resource this time of year. We’ve been exploring how we can use them. We’ve drilled holes in a few and added some hole punched leaves to thread them on to sticks and laces.

With a bit more sparkle they could make lovely christmas decorations!

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.

Cheap and Easy Slime activity wall and box! Perfect for Halloween! We converted the lid of one of our plastic storage boxes in to a slime wall! We drilled holes and cable tied funnels, sieves and tubes to pour our slime in to. We stabilised our lid to the box by using some toy nuts and bolts, so each time we are done we undo the bolts and just put the lid on. Easy!

What is the slime? The supermarket own brand shampoo or conditioner with some food colouring. This is about 40p an litre! Perfect! Add in some spooky spiders and skulls for a Halloween feel and you are away!

The top half of a milk carton makes a great scoop! This was dead popular. So far we’ve rolled it out for three workshops and my 2yr old’s birthday party. Totally worth the effort!

Creative messy play toddler classes for babies, toddlers and preschoolers in Cheltenham.